The Benghazi Coverup Unravels

Foreign Policy is reporting this evening that on October 26th, more than six weeks after the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, its reporters discovered additional documents in the burned out remains of the compound indicating that the Obama administration was aware of possible attack planning before the events that claimed the lives of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three others.

One letter, written on Sept. 11 and addressed to Mohamed Obeidi, the head of the Libyan Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ office in Benghazi, reads:

“Finally, early this morning at 0643, September 11, 2012, one of our diligent guards made a troubling report. Near our main gate, a member of the police force was seen in the upper level of a building across from our compound. It is reported that this person was photographing the inside of the U.S. special mission and furthermore that this person was part of the police unit sent to protect the mission. The police car stationed where this event occurred was number 322.”

The account accords with a message written by Smith, the IT officer who was killed in the assault, on a gaming forum on Sept. 11. “Assuming we don’t die tonight. We saw one of our ‘police’ that guard the compound taking pictures,” he wrote hours before the assault.

Libya’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs may have played a role in the attack by, at a minimum, failing to provide promised security in the days leading up to the attack.

The document also suggests that the U.S. consulate had asked Libyan authorities on Sept. 9 for extra security measures in preparation for Stevens’ visit, but that the Libyans had failed to provide promised support.

“On Sunday, September 9, 2012, the U.S. mission requested additional police support at our compound for the duration of U.S. ambassador Chris Stevens’ visit. We requested daily, twenty-four hour police protection at the front and rear of the U.S. mission as well as a roving patrol. In addition we requested the services of a police explosive detection dog,” the letter reads.

“We were given assurances from the highest authorities in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that all due support would be provided for Ambassador Stevens’ visit to Benghazi. However, we are saddened to report that we have only received an occasional police presence at our main gate. Many hours pass when we have no police support at all.”

The letter concludes with a request to the Libyan Ministry of Foreign Affairs to look into the incident of the policeman conducting surveillance, and the absence of requested security measures. “We submit this report to you with the hopes that an official inquiry can be made into this incident and that the U.S. Mission may receive the requested police support,” the letter reads.

There can be no doubt that the Obama administration knew or ought to have known from the outset that the assault on the Benghazi mission was a premeditated attack, not a spontaneous protest over an obscure video. This can only mean that the subsequent PR campaign, including President Obama’s speech to the United Nations, was a complete fabrication.

Fortunately, the electorate has a chance to render its judgment ahead of the investigation report President Obama is supposedly awaiting; the one that will tell him what he himself did on and about the evening of September 11, 2012.

Barack Obama, in his eyes, was telling the truth about the Libyan attack being caused by a YouTube video. How is this possible? Because Obama first deluded himself into thinking it was the truth. Self-delusion makes lying to others all the more sincere.

Those who crave justice shall have their fill. I can see the end game now. When Obama loses on Tuesday, the media will turn on him like Bacchantes at the sudden appearance of Pentheus. They will rend him limb from limb and Nemesis will feed on his bones. Could such monumental hubris end any other way? This story has all the stuff of a Greek drama. Enjoy the catharsis.

It would be cathartic if the lying Media Hydra were slain but I don’t see it. They will still run amok. We’ll get stories about how lousy the economy is when we are at 3% unemployment. If only Newt would be press secretary…

But, Why kill Ambassador Stevens? What was the objective of the terrorist attack?

I have read some rumors implicating his links to the former Libyan freedom fighters/Al-Queda affiliates. If there is a connection there, why did they turn on the ambassador?

Another rumor suggested the ambassador was now using his Libyan contacts to supply weapons shipments to the Syrian uprising. Again, if that is true, why turn on the ambassador?

I don’t intend to impugn the ambassador – I have no doubt he was working under orders. But if these rumors are remotely true, it ought to raise huge questions about the administration’s Middle East policy.

Has anyone heard anything like these things? We now know it was terrorists, we know it was a planned attack, and we know the US response was questionable, at best. Does anyone yet know why the terrorists attacked?

The Libyan policeman who was seen taking photos in a building opposite the annex would have alarmed the CIA there in Benghazi. Of course they would have written reports, so there should be a communications trail from them to Langley, and from there to the WH. The lack of response from the Libyans to the several calls to increase Libyan police manpower should have increased anybody’s paranoia around the date September 11.

Steven Smith wrote to his gamer buddies a paranoid feeling he had on the 11th. This same wariness would have been a twin feeling with any other experienced officer when he saw events leading up to that night. Surely, there are more people to interview who were on the scene.

~Paules: Those who crave justice shall have their fill. I can see the end game now. When Obama loses on Tuesday, the media will turn on him like Bacchantes at the sudden appearance of Pentheus. They will rend him limb from limb and Nemesis will feed on his bones. Could such monumental hubris end any other way? This story has all the stuff of a Greek drama. Enjoy the catharsis. · 2 hours ago

I hope you’re right. I’m currently in a state of disbelief with friends and relatives, who if only they were exposed to the full truth of this administration, would be in utter disgust. Rather they are mostly deluded by msm that everything is just fine.

The ambassador may have just been in a bad place at the wrong time — his death may just have been incidental to a broader goal of damaging American interests.

If there was mens rea against the ambassador in particular, it reminds me essentially of the caravan ambush in Clear and Present Danger: Hit America at as high a level as possible. Ambassador Stevens was the highest-ranking American within reach. Ergo, attack him.

If your source of weapons and your command chain was Hezbollah, you would support Iran. Iran supports Assad in Syria. If one of the local militias in Benghazi were tied to Hezbollah, then it would target Hezbollah’s and Syria’s enemies. If they believed Stevens was getting arms to the rebels in Syria, then they would kill him if they could. They found a way.

The Turkish visitor to the complex could have been wired, trailed, or could have been a double agent. His driver could have been an informer with the Libyan killers of Stevens.

Anyway, there are any number of reasons Ambassador Stevens could have been marked for death in that area.

Not to throw a wet towel on the everyone’s outrage, but weren’t these drafts of letters that might or might not actually have been sent? And, regardless, weren’t the intended recipients the Libyans? I don’t think they prove that Obama knew anything prior to the attack. They do prove that Stevens was concerned about the security situation!

Like Illiniguy, I am disturbed that these documents were lying on the ground 7 weeks after the fact.

The other extremely disturbing report that came out today, that I read on CBSnews.com, is that Obama did not convene the Counterterrorism Security Group on the night of the attack. Now, I admit, I’d never heard of the CSG until today. I’m not a national security expert. But read the article and draw your own conclusions.

This is what I heard from a security guy (authentic? who knows?) calling into a radio show: Because American sovereignty of the consulate doesn’t extend out to the perimeter posts, they had to employ Libyans to guard the perimeter. That’s why they had to employ some Libyans. What I suspect is, somebody up the chain, somebody not too bright, decided that as long as we have to hire all these Libyans, just let them take over the security. Well, we see how well that worked. They very likely were infiltrated by jihadists who convinced them that they don’t owe the Americans anything. You have US Marines because they’re loyal to the end. Host country police, not so much.

Albert Arthur: Not to throw a wet towel on the everyone’s outrage, but weren’t these drafts of letters that might or might not actually have been sent? And, regardless, weren’t the intended recipients the Libyans? I don’t think they prove that Obama knew anything prior to the attack. They do prove that Stevens was concerned about the security situation!

Like Illiniguy, I am disturbed that these documents were lying on the ground 7 weeks after the fact.

The other extremely disturbing report that came out today, that I read on CBSnews.com, is that Obama did not convene the Counterterrorism Security Group on the night of the attack. Now, I admit, I’d never heard of the CSG until today. I’m not a national security expert. But read the article and draw your own conclusions. · 10 minutes ago

Another senior counter terrorism official says a hostage rescue team was alternately asked to get ready and then stand down throughout the night, as officials seemed unable to make up their minds.

In essence, Hudson argues that the three important players in this episode (the White House, Pentagon, and CIA) have all denied the stories coming from FoxNews that allege wrongdoing or conspiracy.

You’ll be happy to know, Hudson assures us, that the three agencies probably aren’t involved in a conspiracy. Instead, the fog of war means that they just can’t be expected to know what’s going on while Americans are being killed, even though a month has passed and there’s an investigation going on.

Gosh, I feel so much better that three of the main government agencies charged with protecting this country aren’t deliberately malicious. They just haven’t got a clue.

Mel Foil: This is what I heard from a security guy (authentic? who knows?) calling into a radio show: Because American sovereignty of the consulate doesn’t extend out to the perimeter posts, they had to employ Libyans to guard the perimeter. That’s why they had to employ some Libyans.

I suspect that someone was applying bad reasoning– with military bases, even in the US, the “real” area is bigger than the fences for exactly this reason. I have trouble believing that it would be any kind of normal to change that for embassies. (This is why it’s a bad idea to do a protest that involves standing right next to a military bases’ gate–pick a park nearby instead. I do not know the exact distance, but my husband assures me that it’s big enough that he felt perfectly safe as a gate guard, and even was praised by the security inspection team when he “shot” a “suicide bomber” as soon as he showed what he was and got inside the legal area, during one of the inspection tests.)

I know I’ve seen pictures of Marines as gate guards for embassies, too.